Syrian opposition reports ‘massacre’ in Hama province

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(CNN) — An opposition group reported Thursday that government forces have carried out a “massacre” in the village of Tremseh in Hama province, killing 122 people there.
The day’s death toll nationwide reached 189, the Local Coordination Committees of Syria said.
As it has done consistently, Syrian state television blamed “armed terrorist groups” for the killings, accusing them of having shot “indiscriminately at the people of Al-Tremseh village in Hama suburbs. And after calls from the people of the village, the security forces clashed with the terrorist groups, arresting a number of them and confiscated their weapons.”
The violence was also occurring farther south, in the capital, where 12 people were killed, the LCC said. The Damascus neighborhood of Shaghour was under siege by government forces, whose snipers were occupying the roofs of buildings, the LCC said.

The carnage came as a top Syrian diplomat who defected Wednesday said in an interview broadcast Thursday that he has sympathized with the opposition movement since it began in March 2011, but had held out hope that President Bashar al-Assad would change course.
“I am from day one with the revolution,” Nawaf al-Fares, the former Syrian ambassador to Iraq, told Al Jazaeera Arabic. “Due to the political and personal circumstances, just a few people knew about that.”
Al-Fares added, “I had hope, and I was in direct contact with President Bashar. He is now the former Syrian president, because he is a criminal and he is killing the Syrian people.”
Syrian government authorities said al-Fares has been “relieved of his duties.”

Al-Fares is the second high-profile Sunni official to break with the regime in a week. Manaf Tlas, a Republican Guard brigadier general and the son of a former defense minister, defected last week to protest the killing of civilians by government forces.
The moves might be a sign that Sunni allies of the Alawite-dominated regime are displeased with the government’s fierce crackdown on an opposition dominated by Sunnis.
According to the official Syrian Arab News Agency, al-Fares was sworn in as Syrian ambassador to Iraq in 2002.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said al-Fares went to the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Iraqi state TV reported. The Qatari government has been sharply critical of al-Assad’s regime.
Al-Fares “made statements contrary to his job duty to defend the positions of the country and its issues, which requires legal accountability and discipline,” the Syrian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
The statement said he “no longer has anything to do” with the Syrian Embassy in Baghdad or the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Syria’s detached and deluded elite?
Al-Fares also announced his defection from the ruling Baath party, becoming the most senior member to leave. He is from Deir Ezzor, the eastern province that has been hammered lately by Syrian forces, and hails from a tribe along the Syrian-Iraqi border.
“To my brothers in the military, your military doctrine is to defend the homeland against external aggression and protect its borders,” al-Fares said in a video statement given to the TV network Al Jazeera Arabic. It was unclear when the video was shot.
“So did your fathers, sons and sisters become the enemies now? And are they the ones who you should fight? Is that what you have learned in your military schools?”
Al-Fares said he was joining the revolution and called the government “malicious” and “the killer of the people.”
The conflict in Syria has raged for 16 months, defying international peace efforts and leaving world leaders scrambling to find a solution.
Al-Assad’s bloody crackdown on the opposition has sparked international outrage, but he still enjoys the support of allies such as Russia, Iran and China.
Russia and China, which are permanent U.N. Security Council members, have vetoed council draft resolutions that would have condemned the Syrian regime. Many other nations said such resolutions could have pushed al-Assad to stop the crackdown on dissidents seeking his ouster.
Kofi Annan, the former U.N. secretary-general who is now an international U.N. and Arab League envoy to Syria, briefed the council on the crisis Wednesday.
“The council is now discussing what the next step should be and what action they should take,” Annan said. “We should hear something from them in the next few days.”
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Thursday she is hopeful that Russia will back a “serious” measure in the Security Council. But Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov said his government dislikes a recent council draft resolution from Western nations.
“We have stated repeatedly that Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter is unacceptable to us,” Gatilov said, according to state-run RIA Novosti. “Using the resolution to justify the use of force in the future is absolutely unacceptable to us.”
A Security Council resolution under Chapter 7 of the charter could ultimately authorize the use of force.
Opposition groups say more than 15,000 people have died since the violence began in March 2011.

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